Since before he could toddle, Mr. Greengrass had been taught to carry himself with elegance and sophistication. Greengrasses had the best breeding of all the pureblood families remaining in Britain. Now, this didn't mean they were as Noble and Ancient as the House of Black, or as wealthy and pompous as the Malfoys, but their bloodline was just as pure, their estate just as grand, and their heirs just as clever and beautiful.

He clinked goblets with senior wizards in the Department of International Magical Cooperation by evening, and shook hands with foreign trade tycoons by day. His stylish blonde wife organized philanthropy balls. His two young daughters, Daphne and Astoria, impressed his pureblood circles and Ministry colleagues with their precocious minds and magic. The family assets bloomed. No, Mr. Greengrass was perfectly satisfied with his glittering lifestyle and did not feel the urge to punch the stupid smirk off Lucius Malfoy's pale face when his interns bailed on tariff meetings to attend Lucius's stupid peacock-themed masquerade parties at Malfoy Manor every year. He did not even yearn to obliterate Malfoy's stupid drawl as junior officials from Mr. Greengrass's own office gushed for hours a week about the other pureblood wizard's irresistible skill and influence.

"He's such a great man," sighed a witch from Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures.

Mr. Greengrass frowned at the snake-green memo sheet she laid on his desk. It even smelled like Lucius, like expensive satin lining, totally-not-Dark-magic, and EverScent candles from the middle-aged witches who tittered at his dreamy steel-grey eyes. He cleared his throat and smiled tightly. "So, Bulgaria's been exporting endangered Kneazle species as pets again?"

It had started when Mr. Greengrass first attended his mother's social tea at Malfoy Manor. He was a seven-year-old boy, and the bored, pointy-faced host's son standing in the parlor before him suddenly stumbled in horror and pointed behind Mr. Greengrass.

"Look, it's a hairy spider!"

Screaming at the top of his lungs, Mr. Greengrass had clutched at his mother's lace afternoon gown and howled like a Weasley confronted with a tax collector. Not even her soft scolding could sedate him, and he spent the next three hours touring the Manor with the dreadfully smug blond boy at his side. The sun burned red-gold through stained glass gates.

"Wow, that mirror has more jewels than Mother's hairpins," said Mr. Greengrass, halting at a crystal-encased exhibit.

The Malfoy heir brushed back his silky hair with a careless hand. "It's a priceless family heirloom, you know," he informed the younger boy. "Legend goes, if a Mudblood looks into it he...well." He sighed.

"What? Tell me!"

Lucius licked his lips. "He feels spiders in his ears at night," he purred, in an eventual-baritone that was, really, much better suited for praising Ministers of Magic.

Ignoring the tingle in his ears proved more agonizing than morning waltz lessons at the Kensington Academy for Young Wizards. Mr. Greengrass crept after the swaggering older boy, the Dark artefacts and ancestral paintings chilling his blood as they moved down a velvet-draped hallway. Ghostly emerald light pulsed from a book spine on a shelf to his right.

The seven-year-old paused. "We don't have books that glow," he said accusingly.

Malfoy tossed a reply over his retreating shoulder. "Yes, Greengrass," he drawled in what would become Mr. Greengrass's most accurately headache-heralding voice. "They do cost more than what an average lesser House can afford. Knockturn Alley prizes its Dark talismans, you know."

He winced as the visitor's small hand reached to stroke the luminescent black leather. "Ah-ah," breathed Lucius Malfoy. "Dark artefacts will blacken amateur fingernails permanently. Father said so."

That's disgusting, thought Mr. Greengrass in horror as he jerked back. The dim room of cold, lovely treasures suddenly smelled like sweat and rot. As he hurried after his humming guide, Mr. Greengrass let his eyes scan the manor one last time before deciding that potent expensive collectibles or no, Dark magic with its price of blackened fingernails did not mesh nicely with his vision of pureblood nobility one bit.

Later that night, the boy buried his ears in his downy pillows to avoid a spider infestation. He whispered hexes he was far too young to wandlessly perform, the image of the deadly mirror rising in his mind's eye. Of course he wasn't a Mudblood, he was an elite pureblood heir to an inheritance like Malfoy's, but then again, what was that creeping itch all over his earlobes?

"It's not just his blemished and bankrupted post-war name, darling," said Mr. Greengrass, rolling his eyes like a Witch Weekly cover model. "Malfoy's face only comes in three expressions: smug, sulking, and bored. Gee, can't wait to see which one he wears to the wedding reception I'm inviting all my extended family to!"

His wife's face twitched in a smile, but she crinkled the Daily Prophet onto the tea table instead of swatting him on the arm with it.

Asteria rubbed her eyes. "Father, all our extended family will be ecstatic that I've married a legendary pureblooded prat instead of a kindly Muggle-born."

The ancient Estate air was crisp with summer solstice rays, and the rolling hills outside the mansion sparkled with wild blooms and birdsong. Mr. Greengrass held a parchment roll of silver-inked statements from his numerous funds across three continents, and the Romanian trade representative had invited him to an exclusive sashimi restaurant in Milan after a week of successful negotiations on portrait-personality licensing. And his daughter was marrying Lucius Malfoy's son.

He flicked the scroll off his silk-robed knee. "Malfoy isn't even a reformed Death Eater for the right reasons! He stopped threatening and bribing his way through the Departments only because it wouldn't work after the War. Do you know how many officials he bribed after the First-"

Mr. Greengrass knew the shrewd look Astoria was giving him.

"Father, are you concerned about my fiancé's morality, or still jealous of his father for being promoted before you over thirty years ago?"

Chirping birds were flitting over the lawns outside with sweet bright notes.

He pursed his lips. "Snakeskin robes. Who wears those. You know the Malfoys didn't employ a house elf for years? It's just not proper for a well-bred young lady like you-"

Asteria, his wise, level-headed daughter, almost guffawed like a pub crawler. "I may have to ask the Weasleys how to survive it."

The parchment roll grew damper in his hand, and Mr. Greengrass shot his wife a pleading look. "The hair ointments Lucius Malfoy uses!" he blustered now, not caring if his amused family saw his petty pureblood rivalry for the one-sided catfight it was, or that his decades of meticulous elite breeding were discredited by a childish whine. "Peacock feather oil! Albino peacock feather oil! How does he face himself in the mirror?"

The splendid union of bloodlines had been a long time coming, Mr. Greengrass knew.

The adult Lucius Malfoy had always indulged in his lavish power like a newly rich investor in the start-up joke magic industry. The Wizengamot purred under his manicured fingertips, the Hogwarts Board of Governors lapped milk out of saucers whisked from Malfoy Manor, and the Department of Magical Law Enforcement organized annual birthday parties with silver-and-green confetti to boost morale among its junior staffers. And he somehow always felt a leather dress shoe crush his heel on the way to the lift before work.

"Morning, Malfoy," he had said, one memorable morning when his spirits had been high.

A white blond head turned to eye him. Fortunately, Mr. Greengrass stood impeccably in tailored wool, a mask of haughty but subtle grace etched all over his fine features. He watched as Lucius Malfoy raised a slow pale eyebrow.

"I hear you've welcomed your second child into this world," he drawled. "Congratulations on becoming a father again after...what has it been, two years now?"

Briefly, Mr. Greengrass's inner seven-year-old arachnophobe fretted that Lucius could make even the best news sound ridiculous. But the Ministry bureaucrat and pureblood patriarch laughed and clapped a hand onto Malfoy's velvet-lined shoulder. "Daphne and Draco are the same age, and now they can be role models for my Astoria."

Lucius Malfoy's lip curled like a dried leaf, and Mr. Greengrass almost wavered on his cool, amiable smile before he realized Arthur Weasley stood behind them.

"Ah, Arthur," called the blond wizard to the red-haired one, who clutched a rod-like metal Muggle contraption in one hand. "In your best robes as always. I was beginning to wonder if that little house of yours had any rags to spare after you had your curtains made."

The Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office liaison turned red. "Out of my way, Lucius dear," he snapped, attempting to wiggle past the two Slytherin alumni. "Some of us have actual work to be doing, instead of the arm-twisting and bigotry endorsement you clearly do all day."

Witches and wizards brushed past them as Mr. Greengrass saw his old Housemate tip his head back. Yet Arthur Weasley looked uncertain as Lucius laughed with oily delight, and placed his hand forcefully onto Weasley's arm, his voice low and soft so that no one else could hear. "Why the animosity, Arthur?" he whispered. "I can't imagine you understand the trials I suffered, inflicting pain and fear to filthy blood traitors just like you."

Mr. Greengrass stiffened.

"Under the Imperius Curse, of course," smirked Lucius, basking in Weasley's goggle-eyed stare. He released his grip, and the redheaded wizard clattered into a sign post.

As the Muggle artefact rolled to the pavement several feet from Arthur Weasley, Mr. Greengrass twitched his wand, levitating it safely into his hand. He turned it in his slim fingers. "A particularly strong and thorough Imperius Curse," agreed Mr. Greengrass, just to see Lucius's face sour.

This earned him a look of relieved triumph from Weasley, which scandalized him.

"Often mistaken by filthy blood traitors as illegal intentions," he clarified.

As they watched Arthur Weasley's fuming red face disappear back into the crowd of morning traffic, Mr. Greengrass turned to his companion in higher spirits. The two wizards turned heads as they brushed shoulders past minor officials and smoothly greeted their higher-ranking colleagues.

"So your daughter is named Asteria?" asked Lucius smoothly, and Mr. Greengrass allowed his chest to puff a little.

"She's one of the first to be born after the Dark Lord fell," he said, inclining his head with easy elegance to a Transportation wizard. "Now that our kind has peace, she'll grow up with a healthy upbringing in the company of wholesome children."

He tried to ignore the look of amusement inching into Lucius's pale eyes.

"Company, meaning the spawn of half-bloods and provincial lackeys?"

Mr. Greengrass scanned his memory for incriminating people he had associated with in front of Lucius. "I don't recall contaminating my values lately," he said, allowing his voice to cool slightly.

"Pity," said Lucius, his voice bored. "I was referring to your ancestral estate, tucked up in those backwards marshes and villages where our kind never seem to enjoy the isolation from modern society." He flicked at his sleeve. "In any case, if you do decide to rejoin the circles of advanced civilization one day, surely I can spare you a few places on this season's guest lists."

The natural waterways and wet foliage of Mr. Greengrass's ancient family estate sparkled in sunlight and old magic. Oftentimes a rafting Muggle couple or wandering village child blinked twice, sure that the damp wood and croaking creatures hid some veiled secret. Yet as soon as the hills and mansion shimmered in view, the Muggle would be seized with a sudden awe for the soft clouds above them. Both the view and memory of the magical world would fade into the lull of insect chirps and driftwood.

Mr. Greengrass was raised beyond the old wards his ancestors had cast.

His parents were purebloods from comfortably wealthy bloodlines, and had met while locked outside the Slytherin common room at Hogwarts one evening. Their heir grew up among the controlled magic of wizarding society and the natural peace of swaying grasses under a humid sun.

He was Sorted into Slytherin where he chuckled at dull jokes with the pureblood elite, flocked to networking parties in dress robes that spoke quietly of status, and spent hours daydreaming about home in the lamp-lit libraries. Old-fashioned, Mr. Greengrass steered clear of the exhilarating social changes promised by the Death Eater recruiters.

Blood purity, he reasoned, was clearly desirable. Just not worth risking his status, life, and fortune to stand in Lucius Malfoy's gloating hooded shadow for. Merlin, he hated those stupid standard-issue black robes. Mr. Greengrass wondered snidely if the Dark Lord put in mass orders at Madam Malkin's for his uniformed followers. The ranks of the Death Eaters crawled with half-blood brutes, the dregs of pureblood Britain, and the crudely mannered. It was embarrassing, actually.

Then he met the woman he married, and they kept their heads low as the world burned alive, away and far from their new daughter, Daphne.

The problem with the ideology, Mr. Greengrass theorized over a cup of tea, was the way it made people look at you.

Here was the truth: Greengrasses had the best breeding. It ensured a wizard copious amounts of grace, subtlety, and the kind of privilege that made the less fortunate scrapbook Daily Prophet spotlights on your gardens, ask your secretary where you got your robes, and rack their memories for the pivotal and obscure Goblin rebellion your auction-acquired antiques dated from.

One glance at the VIP donor lists of the CRRC (Cruciatus Recovery Research Center), SEMBAW (Scholarships for the Empowerment of Muggle-Born Armenian Witches), and the Unicorn Rescue Project (he quite hated the stupid prancing logo) revealed Mr. Greengrass as the astute and powerful magical citizen he was. He thrived on the awe and envy of the less highly regarded.

Yaxley had once, in their Hogwarts days, sneered openly at the Muggle-born students in their year while his own parents moldered away in an old mansion too decrepit to host social teas for the executive boards of Squib orphans' charities and portrait guilds' festivals.

A well-bred pureblood, Mr. Greengrass thought, sipping smugly, is a leader of wizarding elegance in politics, the arts, and philanthropic causes. The ancestral house was a modern brand. Lucius had soiled the Malfoys by dyeing his blond roots in Dark magic, Arthur Weasley had expanded his brood instead of his department connections, while he had done the opposite all these years.

It pained him to imagine a Britain where the last pureblood scions, inbred, blacklisted, or bankrupt, left his heirs with no choice but to marry good-looking, rich, and influential foreigners.

At nights when he agonized and pretended to sleep on his lavish silken four-poster, he would fantasize about the Bulgarian Minister of Magic catching sight of his great-great-great-grandfather's silver pocket watch, or strolling past his study as the lead curse-breaker at Gringotts did a double-take at the ruby-set sword gifted to the family by a Muggle king, displayed next to a green-stamped Hogwarts diploma.

"But that..." the sleek man would stutter, pointing a shaky finger. "That must be from the thirteenth century, at least!"

"Indeed it is," Mr. Greengrass would say, with a smirk more refined than smug, "For his bravery and cunning in his king's service, Torin Greengrass was offered the hand of a beautiful princess." He would pause. "Yet he turned her down for the king's own sword, to gift himself a greater challenge to charm."

"Your heritage is one steeped in might and centuries of magic!"

And so Mr. Greengrass would glance in detached amusement back at the awed lesser wizard, and shrug. "Why yes, our bloodline was pure even when our name was spelled Grenegres."

The teacup had grown cold in his hand, and at his desk in the Department of International Magical Cooperation, Mr. Greengrass sat up straighter. His dream of owning a world-renowned Quidditch team dissipated as his secretary dropped a stack of files over his committee budget scroll.

"The Minister of Magic is here to see you, Mr. Greengrass," she told him.

He scrambled to stand, smacking a few nonexistent crinkles from his new robes. "Send Kingsley in, will you?" he said, feeling pleased. "I can't wait to see his face when I tell him I've hit retirement age."

Once, as the family strolled through Diagon Alley looking for hair potions, six-year-old Daphne halted in front of a glossy shop window.

"Father, is it true that Muggle-borns aren't as good as real wizards?"

Mr. Greengrass scanned the crowds for angry faces, but turned back to his daughter in relief when he saw none. He exchanged a glance with his wife, who held a napping Asteria. Daphne hummed a melody as he crouched down to her eye level.

"We're better," he agreed quietly, "but let's not say that in public, understand? Muggle-borns can be more talented than even pureblood wizards, but blood purity is very important, Daphne."

The smell of baked cinnamon rolls wafted to their end of the Alley, and the loud shrieks of children suddenly chased the patter of small footsteps. A red-faced woman with auburn hair emerged from the entrance of a secondhand robe shop.

"Fred! George! Get back here this instant!" she was shouting into the crowd.

Mrs. Greengrass smiled condescendingly in the woman's direction. "And that is a legendary blood traitor family," she explained to Daphne, who was gazing wistfully as the two mud-stained boys shoved strangers to escape. "They don't seem to care about their magical heritage at all, and even despise those of us who do respect our own bloodlines."

The faster of the boys let out a whoop as he reached the spa parlor the Greengrasses stood outside. His twin craned his neck for a glimpse of their mother.

"Oh," said Daphne, tearing her eyes from a furious-looking Molly Weasley. "That sounds pretty bad."

Mr. Greengrass ruffled his daughter's hair, understanding too well a child's urge to run wild. "But there are wizards who care too much," he said dryly, winking to his wife. "They like to hex everyone to prove their worth to themselves. We try not to associate with them either, darling."

Unless they're Lucius, he thought, a scowl crossing his fine features. That man just does not go away.

"Male pattern baldness," said Mr. Greengrass.

Dinner plates clinked as their house elf stacked ceramic and silver. The candlelight of the Estate mansion's dining room flickered, casting honey-warm shadows on the oil paintings of blue-plumed marsh birds and swooning nymphs from Greek mythology.

His daughter folded her napkin carefully. "What about Lucius Malfoy is trouble again, Father?"

"No, not him." Mr. Greengrass avoided eye contact with his wife, whose ladylike snort nearly caused the house elf to knock over a candlestick. "I mean Narcissa Malfoy, formerly Black. You do know that a man inherits early patterned baldness through his maternal line, don't you? Take Cygnus Black, your fiancé's grandfather. Early pattern baldness. I would know. I was there. So much for the Black good looks. His three daughters' graduation balls. Every last one, even the middle one who ended up running to marry a Muggle-"

His wife said his name. A soft moisturized hand covered his twitching one. "You've met Draco," she said, eyes searching his. "He's a wonderful young man. Smart, loyal, brave...rich, the last legitimate descendent of the House of Black..."

"Vain...nosy..." suggested Asteria. But she was blushing.

"I know," said Mr. Greengrass miserably, eyes tracing the imported lace trim on the azure tablecloth. He heard a scolding voice in his head inform him he was a prejudiced old man. "But do you want to be married to Draco when his hairline starts receding before your son goes to Hogwarts?"

There was a pause, and then Asteria said, halfheartedly, "Or daughter."

Instead of reminding the oil marsh birds that old Abraxas Malfoy had been an only son as surely as Lucius and Draco were, Mr. Greengrass took a moment to comfort himself. Maybe being co-grandfather with Lucius wouldn't be so bad. He was far more popular in the Ministry than Lucius, certainly due to the latter's convicted Death Eater baggage, but he had been invited to join the Order of Merlin committee, for Salazar's sake.

Of course his grandson wouldn't prefer a patron of albino peacock toiletries over him.

Recruitment for Death Eaters during the First Wizarding War had struck Mr. Greengrass's career for both the better and the worse.

Floo networks had to be tinkered with, anti-Apparition wards had to be licensed for the Estate's outer gates, and most humiliating of his safety precautions, his professional image took a dive for the domestic.

He didn't mind flashing pictures of baby Daphne to his co-workers, not really, but before her birth, he had rambled his own ears to exhaustion about his beautiful wife, his devotion to shopping for skin creams with her, and the Italian designer robes he couldn't wait to purchase for her three-quarters birthday next month. Rookwood (not an outed spy then) had stared at Mr. Greengrass in pity. Avery eyed him like a giant spider. Macnair, that sweaty brute, who was almost absolutely in deep with the Dark Lord, colored his response with flecks of spit and whirled out of the small office.

During the war, Mr. Greengrass considered inducing a nervous sweat just to live out the danger in St. Mungo's, but couldn't imagine sleeping anywhere else besides his wife's side.

He graciously requested the presence of witches and wizards of pureblood descent to join the couple for romantic beach trips to the Mediterranean, acting every bit the oblivious wizard. The war raged on, and people disappeared. The Greengrasses held hands in Diagon Alley's battered shops to buy household supplies. Colleagues emerged ashen-faced from restrooms, and obituaries grew terser, but the section longer. Mr. Greengrass and his wife threw family-themed parties for his Department.

Energetic colleagues grew sallow. Dirty lunch dishes stopped piling up on cabinets.

Mr. Greengrass tensed when people, not the murderous kind, whispered about him, but he felt too hollow to hurt when a junior assistant in the International Magical Office of Law stared into his eyes after the disappearance of her parents and asked him bitterly, "Why do the cowards like you always survive?"

His throat went dry and he had no answer.

Hogwarts was a dark, gloom-soaked place after the Ministry break-ins and Lucius's arrest.

Mr. Greengrass knew his wife wrote extensively to their daughters, advising with a sharp eye on who to befriend, who to study with, and who to absolutely avoid. He felt the sting of guilt as he hurried in and out of the Estate, murmuring a quick work to his wife before Disapparating. Of course Scrimgeour drove them hard, but he knew that Daphne also needed her parents during her O.W.L.S. year.

In any event, both girls survived the year of Umbridge, the Inquisitorial Squad, and Daphne's not being appointed a Slytherin Prefect intact without lasting trauma.

Sun and moon, gold and silver. Visitors to the Greengrass Estate patted Daphne's bright honey-gold hair, and praised the silver-gold sheen of Asteria's tresses. The girls' mother was very proud of their looks, but fortunately, the two sisters quickly revealed their cunning and wisdom as equally remarkable assets.

Once, when the arithmetic tutor hired by Mrs. Greengrass brought over her young son at the family's warm request, Daphne spent dinner shooting smiles and gentle questions at the boy. By dessert, he had relaxed enough to crack a joke about Hungarian Horntail fecal matter. As Daphne grew older and lovelier, she watched her mother style her blonde locks, select tasteful robes, and entertain old curmudgeonly Ministry officials.

Her letters from Hogwarts dealt with handsome conquests -"it's okay to be half-blood if his Muggle side is absurdly attractive, right?"- and the Slytherin House politics, which unsurprisingly seemed to revolve around a certain Draco Malfoy.

"Why should Malfoy shine in the spotlight?" said Mr. Greengrass crossly, at an early dinner after the Sirius Black year.

"Well, his father kind of bribes the Hogwarts Board of Governors," Daphne replied. Her face was thoughtful. "Also, Pansy Parkinson is constantly on him like poverty on a Weasley." She blanched. "Did I say that, Mother? Malfoy has definitely been corrupting my courtesy reflex."

This alarmed Mr. Greengrass. "But of course," he started. "Draco Malfoy is no appropriate companion for a student of your maturity and upbringing."

At this his eldest daughter slid a smirk towards her younger sister and speared a slice of turkey. "No," she purred. "His father, on the other hand, is an entirely charming older gentleman."

He shuddered. "Daphne, that is disgusting."

"Deviant," she agreed easily, chewing her food. "But anyway, as I was going to say, ol' Draco actually brought him in to have a word with Professor Snape, did you know. Oh, before Snape outed our Defense teacher as a werewolf. Merlin, I keep forgetting how many things happened this year. The hippogriff attack certainly wasn't the highlight."

"It wasn't even a scratch," said Asteria, rolling her eyes.

"I'll bet it wasn't." Mr. Greengrass nodded in agreement even though he hadn't seen the wound. But when his youngest daughter spoke up, it was to share a truth that needed to be clarified. "How bad was it?" he asked her.

Asteria drained her goblet of juice. "It was bad enough that Pansy would blacklist us from good seats at dinner. If she, er, caught us laughing at his...suffering."

"Did you have to eat dinner with the dregs of your House, darling?" Mrs. Greengrass frowned at the asparagus.

"Nothing that bad, Mother," interrupted Daphne. "But Great Salazar, I swear this is the year she tries to rope him into her clutches. It's been Draco this, Draco that, and when I tried to gossip about that really fit Quidditch player I wrote you about, Roger Davies, she called me selfish! I'm starting to question why I thought this friendship had advantages for me."

"I thought you two gossiped about Gilderoy Lockhart for hours last year?" offered Asteria.

"Ugh." One candle nearly blew out from Daphne's snort. "Not even. She always wanted to giggle about his looks, but I was more interested in the type of witch he was attracted to."

Mr. Greengrass tried to participate. "So, Pansy is a poor friend?"

"But Daphne can't afford to not be friends with her," explained Asteria, as if he were naive. She gave him a look. "As long as Draco's father has influence, whoever he likes most will be treated the best by Slytherins. And since he's a spoiled prat who can't leave Potter alone, that person will have to be the biggest kiss-ass. That's Pansy."

"You literally cannot oppose her," nodded Daphne.

Asteria's eyes were calculating now, narrowed. "I doubt he'll end up marrying her, though. I think Malfoy's staking out for a willowy blonde type, since he's such a Mummy's boy. He doesn't even like her, because I've seen him around Nott, and he's alright to him, but just moans and pouts around Pansy."

"Not marriage material," tutted Mrs. Greengrass, and then an owl hooted outside the window with the Parkinsons' poison-pink party invitation.

Yes, his daughters were very bright, Daphne with a flamboyant streak that embraced spectacle and merriness. Patrician aloofness was not compatible with her hair tosses, flirtatious laughs, and playful cheer. More than one family associate had offered Mr. Greengrass a betrothal offer of their sons, but he felt confident in the modern witch's ability to choose her own husband.

"As long as he's pureblood, respectable, and someone you'd be happy with," gushed Mrs. Greengrass to their daughters, "Your father and I will have nothing to nag about."

Mr. Greengrass sometimes wasn't sure if Asteria could thrive on his lifestyle. She was the child who flipped through herbology books in the library, did not return adults' insincere smiles, and spoke honestly but respectfully since a young age to grown wizards in their circles. It hurt him to imagine his quiet Asteria yanked into a world of purchased kindness and false friendships.

"Please, Mother," he said dryly. "There are no eligible young ladies in Daphne and Asteria's generation anyway. If either or both of them had been boys, well. Parkinson's daughter is a poisonous little troll, and the rest of the pureblood daughters are blood traitors or new wizarding stock."

His elderly mother clutched his hand. "How many generations?"

"Oh, say," Mr. Greengrass shrugged. "Four to five." Clearly not any ancient noble family's first choice.

His mother had cried once, when her son informed her that no more children would be born after Asteria.

"No heirs to carry on the Greengrass name!" she sobbed. "What would your poor father say?"

"Eh," he had said, feeling childish in her presence. "We're probably someone else's cadet branch anyway," and she'd cried harder. Blood purity was quite the value in her youth, more so than in his.

"Ah, old friend, not going to cry today, are you?"

Fountains of champagne launched frothy gold streaks through the air, and canaries glided in preset arches over the heads of wedding guests. Each note was a low hum, and the ambiance shimmered softly with consonant chords, easy conversation, and the melodies of translucent berry-crystal wind-chimes. The afternoon rays caught the foliage just so.

Stiffening, Mr. Greengrass turned from the sculpted bushes to see the ex-Death Eater leaning on a black walking stick.

He nodded at it. "The snake-head one too much for the wedding?"

"Too much after the war," Lucius said bluntly, and tilted his head to avoid a swooping canary. "For our lives of peace, reparation, and a reformed view of the world."

The two men spent a few seconds of silence to appraise each other properly, both dressed to in simple cuts of neutral olive, dull champagne gold, and black. Before the War, Mr. Greengrass knew Lucius might have opted for the sharply tailored, richly made robes imported from the continent. But the spare cuts underscored Lucius's new image as the ambitious man seduced by the Dark, but saved by Harry Potter and his love of kin. Guests sat at creamy tables accented with lavender and old jonquil, leaning back to enjoy the crisp air and tenuous glow.

"Saving Harry Potter's life and being saved by Harry Potter," said Lucius finally, eyes falling on a tall, slender woman as she laughed with guests, silvery hair in a chignon, graceful in beige ankle-length chiffon. "It tends to open one's eyes to the benefits of minimalist living."

Mr. Greengrass marveled at this man. "I thought Azkaban did that."

"Well, I suppose you're right as always," drawled the ex-Death Eater, and he seemed ten years younger. "Azkaban must have showed me the superficiality of status and wealth. My War trials, ah, showed me the virtue of humility and the worth of the impure."

"That even blood traitors can be good for the magical world."

"Precisely," said Lucius, and they watched a cheerful young witch with golden curls air-kiss a grudging Macmillan schoolmate on both cheeks. The wizard was buttoned, groomed, and listening to Daphne chatter about the canaries, pointing to other guests to ask the occasional question.

"Haven't seen the Macmillans in years," admitted Mr. Greengrass. "Good family."

"Name is still on every damn benefit concert's donor list." Lucius made a face of pain. "I don't understand half of your guest list, Greengrass, I really don't."

At the punch table, a squawking canary flailed in the chubby hand of a pink-faced boy, who refused to release the bird. The brunette woman holding him scolded, but not very angrily. She straightened as Narcissa glided over like a hostess, and her tired eyes softened.

"The former Andromeda Black," Mr. Greengrass heard the voice muse. "And there's her grandson. Did you know, before I wanted to grow up just like my father, I kept a map in my room, with a pin on the birthplace of every recorded Metamorphmagus?"

"Didn't know you had dreams of greatness," said Mr. Greengrass.

"Sometimes, after the War ended and I had trouble sleeping," Lucius went on, "I wondered what I could say to Andromeda Tonks to make Narcissa proud, so that Draco could meet his aunt properly, and Narcissa could be a part of Teddy's life. There were always misgivings, deep in some part of me, that a boy with werewolf and Muggle blood could be a real Metamorphmagus. Fascinating. Yet I never cared much before if the wrong sort of blood produced weak magic, Greengrass."

Mr. Greengrass whisked two flutes of glimmering fuchsia liquor off a floating tray, offering one to his old schoolmate. "Magic is a relatively small part of my life," Mr. Greengrass told the refined, proud man. "I don't ferret for glory to better the quality of magic, because that's a sort of noble I never cared much for. I played cards in this circle so that men would envy me as I walked past with my grand, flawless family. Isn't that what you wanted too? A world of people just like us, but never as good as us."

A strained laugh escaped from Lucius. "You've been a credit to your daughters," he said, and it sounded like the clink of freshly minted Galleons.

"So toast with me," suggested Mr. Greengrass. "Believe we can be admired again, even if all the world's values are shifting before our eyes."

"To weddings, then, where...ahem, lesser families may join lines with the Malfoy legacy."

Mr. Greengrass groaned. "I don't know how the Dark Lord ever mistook you for a big important terrorist," he said accusingly to a now-smirking Lucius. At least he was delicately swirling the contents of the glass, whose contents darkened to violet. "You base snob."

A snowy-haired great-aunt toddled past him, and Mr. Greengrass switched to his composed smile as she raised a senile eyebrow at his comment. The old woman melted into the bushes, praising the atmosphere and taste of the event over her shoulder. Of course it was no blasé spectacle of wealth.

He tried once more. "But thankfully, your Draco is a handsome young man, and he is always good to Asteria."

"He has his father's aristocratic good looks," said Lucius archly.

"The upsides of inbreeding," Mr. Greengrass half-joked, and immediately regretted it.

"To Arthur Weasley, then. May his offspring's weddings leave him slightly poorer than he started and legion with red-headed grandchildren."

Glasses clinked sweet as singing bells, and liquor the shade of azure was downed.

The pub made Mr. Greengrass nervous, because he was not a grimy counter and sallow lighting sort of wizard. The stool scraped on its three legs as he scooted closer to the haggard blond wizard across the table. Howls and the slaps of calloused hands on etched wood muffled the seedy ballad playing in the background.

"So Scorpius is impressing his tutors," he began.

The sneer from Lucius Malfoy was not what Mr. Greengrass expected, and he frowned, leaning back. His eyes clasped onto the ragged fingernails on the other wizard's hand. "Your youngest daughter," said Lucius tensely, "has not been entirely cooperative."

Mr. Greengrass stifled a retching sound as he set down the cracked glass. He had read Asteria's letters with her mother, of course.

"She is..." Strange pause. "Extremely tolerant. Have you heard?"

"I hear the family has been touring the Muggle memorials on wizarding holidays," said Mr. Greengrass glumly, who had not exactly rejoiced at the news either. "Sponsoring and organizing arts festivals to encourage the proliferation of wizarding culture to the families of the Muggle-born. Taking Scorpius to shop for toy trains in Muggle London instead of visiting the grandparents in their French villa on weekends-"

"It's an embarrassment!" hissed Lucius.

Two minutes ago, Mr. Greengrass might have coughed up the vile liquor in agreement. The more he inhaled the smoke, sweat, and slime of the crawling pub, however, the less he cared. "I put on much of the same shows," he said, meaning it. "It's only natural my daughter learns to please magical Britain as well."

A fly landed on the blackened rim of Lucius Malfoy's glass, and he blasted it to white dust with a stiff wand movement.

"Merlin," said Mr. Greengrass, sitting up straighter. "That was fast. Have you joined a duelling club in France? I've always wanted your reflexes, ever since that time we-"

"Greengrass." Pale eyes were narrowed, and Lucius exhaled slowly. "It is not a show for the public. She intends to raise my grandson as a Muggle sympathizer, prying the child with beliefs that they are not so different from me and you after all," he mimicked.

In some deep dark recess of Mr. Greengrass's heart, the words dug in and itched. He snorted. "Your words, not hers."

"A Malfoy, as a blood traitor," Lucius was saying through gritted teeth. "I never thought I would live to see the day. And my own grandson, no less. Did you know she talked to Draco about encasing the Malfoy family heirlooms in glass cases and keeping them dormant? The nerve."

"Oh." A memory struck him. "You mean the Dark artefacts."

Lucius scowled. "They are family heirlooms that date back to the thirteenth century. Back when our surname was signed Malfoi."

Mr. Greengrass kept a straight face as he swigged another mouthful. "Dark artefacts hardly provide a safe environment for a child to grow up in," he tsked.

"It's as if she wants to take our grandson away from us." Lucius continued as if he hadn't spoken, staring ahead petulantly now that his cheap firewhiskey had kicked in. "Narcissa is heartbroken. I may seem wealthy, Greengrass, and comfortable and legally clean, but losing visits from your only grandchild to Muggle exhibits is not the way I planned to spend my twilight years."

"Now, Lucius, I'm sure Asteria wouldn't tell Scorpius that Muggles are equal to our kind. I've raised her better than that," chided Mr. Greengrass.

"Impressionable young people have been known to change ideologies over the course of a violent war," snapped Lucius. He spoke as if the Second Wizarding War was all his drinking partner's fault.

Mr. Greengrass drained his glass.

Lucius groaned.

"I may be sick from this," he warned. "Pathetic liquor of your choosing, and concern over my grandson's fate."

Mr. Greengrass grimaced. "I'm sure you've had worse in Azkaban."